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Fri, 27 May 2016 16:03:04 +0000en-UShourly1https://wordpress.org/?v=4.8.1AudioShield Review – Got Rhythm? HTC Vivehttp://www.virtualrealityreviewer.com/GAME-detail/audioshield-review-got-rhythm-htc-vive/
Fri, 27 May 2016 16:03:04 +0000http://www.virtualrealityreviewer.com/?post_type=os_game&p=4465AudioShield is a fun music game which lets you use your own songs or ones pulled from SoundCloud. You defend off music as it takes the shape of colourful orbs rushing towards you. Being attacked by music in the game is fun but suited better as a party game than one you spend hours with. The orbs not lining up with the rhythm of the songs is a letdown and poor UI development can be frustrating.

Audioshield, which is available to purchase on Steam now for 19.99, is exclusively for the HTC Vive and is developed by Dylan Fitterer an independent game developer whose previous work includes the much loved 2008 game Audiosurf.

Describing Audioshield and what you do in it is pretty straight forward as games go. With your Vive on you stand in the centre of your room with controllers in hand while in Virtual Reality you are standing in an arena with two coloured shields in each hand. Your left hand is holding a blue shield and your right hand an orange shield. These colours are important as matching up the colours of the shield with the incoming projectiles is what you do in Audioshield. However as simplistic as it may sound there is a bit more to it than that. Which each controller in hand your movement determines the position of the shields that you carry and as the different orbs come flying down at you, you block the corresponding colour of orb with the colour of the shield. The orbs come in three different types; a single orb, a longer straight line of orbs, and a long curved line of orbs. You aim at these letting your shield take the impact of the orbs and this is how you score points. You do on occasion get a purple coloured orb instead of blue or orange and to block this you cross your shields or pull both triggers on the controller to form a purple shield in front of you.

There are two different arenas to choose from and these do look really nice and well-polished. One you could describe as a sports arena while the other a futuristic concert hall. A few more arenas would have been nice to play around in though. You also get the choice of three shields to select from and they come in different shapes and sizes. Other than being visually different I didn’t notice any difference between each shield during gameplay.

Audioshield is a music game that will use a song to determine the pattern of the projectiles that come at you when you’re in the arena. Songs can be pulled from SoundCloud or even your own music from your hard drive so this gives you practically an endless supply of different experiences within the game. Every song you play ranks your attempt with Technical score, misses, most consecutive hits, hit percentage, artistic expression, physical activity and most powerful hit. These are then all combined to give you an overall score. Each song has its own online leaderboard with rankings so that when you play a song you are playing against anyone who has played it before you. This is a nice feature which if your favourite songs are being used in Audioshield games around the world you have a bit of competition and can encourage and motivate you to replay songs not just for the fun of trying to finish the level or for the love of the song.

The UI is pretty basic too and doesn’t look anything too flashy. I did find scrolling through songs to be actually harder than it should be, scrolling would either fly up or down too fast. I eventually found a sweet spot on the Vives touchpad and with minimum movement of my thumb I could scroll up and down by column. Unfortunately though I’d have to search for this spot every time I went back into the songs list. This was unnecessarily hard and also annoying to see it was left this way especially when the in-game mechanics flow so well.

The VR holds up pretty well and you get caught up concentrating on blocking the orbs so much you do get really immersed inside the game. When you do mistime a hit and an orb gets by your defences and flies towards your head, you do flinch a little. With the controllers there is vibrate feedback as your shield and the orb collide. An obvious feature perhaps, but adds nicely to the immersion. Plus the way orbs smash against your shield in gameplay is particularly satisfying and the animation of the orbs exploding into a lot of little pieces around you looks great and you wouldn’t get that without VR.

When I first loaded up Audioshield and had picked a song, chosen which shields to use and loaded up into the arena I started feeling like a futuristic gladiator. When the song started and all the orbs came flying towards me as I started to block them from side to side swapping my hands around I suddenly felt I was being tricked as I wasn’t a cool gladiator defending this onslaught. I was, in fact, dancing alone in a room. Audioshield can be a lot of fun but its biggest problem is it’s a rhythm game without any rhythm. The orbs seem randomly generated rather than generated off of the rhythm of the song that playing. You really want to get into the beat of the song as it reaches high tempo or hits that part of your favourite song but as you are hitting the orbs out of sync you get pulled right out of it and never get totally caught up in the music. Playing on a harder difficulty the orbs did seem more in tune with the music but it was still not perfect.

Audioshield is Guitar Hero with less guitar and more hero thrown in, with greater emphasis on action than music. It was a fun game to play in patches but not something I would keep playing for hours on end. However, I would probably pick up it up now and then and play out a few songs. It would be more suited as a party game where everyone can take turns and get to laugh at how ridiculous you look waving your hands around. The game was really let down by poor UI development and the fact that rhythm from the music is not used in the gameplay. On the plus side if you do enjoy Audioshield then you are not limited to the amount of different variations within the game. With a little more polish and a bit more variety, Audioshield could really be something to sing about.

]]>Chronos Review – Prepare To Age Oculus CV1http://www.virtualrealityreviewer.com/GAME-detail/chronos-review-prepare-to-age/
Mon, 23 May 2016 17:34:21 +0000http://www.virtualrealityreviewer.com/?post_type=os_game&p=4450Chronos is a 3rd Person light RPG mixed up with a bit of Dark Souls. It offers a challenge, but nothing a bit of time and some hard grafting can't over come. You won't be blown away but the use of VR but the game does look very beautiful inside your headset. With 10-15 hours of gameplay, you will walk away after beating Chronos feeling you have earned this one.

Chronos is a Third-Person RPG for the Oculus Rift available from the Oculus Store which was developed by Gunfire Games and is an exclusive title for VR and Oculus.

At the start of Chronos you are given the option to choose whether you wish to be a male or female protagonist. Then you have the decision to make: to carry an axe or a trusty sword from the start. Whatever your decision is it won’t have much impact on your playthrough. After this you are then taken to the village elder. Here, through shadow theatre you are told the story of the game and of how you have been chosen to take on this great evil and save your homeworld from the Dragon.

Chronos is like the younger brother of a Dark Soul’s game. It’s not as big or as hard as its older brother but it still packs a punch and won’t go down without a fight. And fight you will. The combat in the game is not anything new or exciting. You attack, block, parry or dodge and that’s pretty much it. But as simple as the controls are there is much more to it than that. Every enemy is a threat to you and if you don’t take them seriously they will punish you even if you have beaten them 5-10-20 times before. There is an art to each character type, a certain pattern that you will have to find to dispatch them. Of course this will depend on your style of play and the weapon you use.

The world in which the game starts is a post-apocalyptic one, although you don’t spend a lot of time. here, because to kill the dragon you must enter the labyrinth. This is set in a high fantasy world and not just full of monsters but also puzzles to slow your progress through the labyrinth. The puzzles are generally light and don’t take lots of time to figure out but trekking back and forth to find a missing piece is the real challenge. There is no hand holding with Chronos so when you do move around you don’t have a map so you can sometimes get lost or take a wrong turn. However, as you’re in a labyrinth you really shouldn’t find it a doddle to get around anyway. The further you get through the labyrinth the more doors you can open that connect back to previous parts of the chapter. This will allow you to skip parts of the labyrinth that you have previously explored and avoid the enemies that occupy the halls if you die. Save Points are giant gemstones that you use to teleport from the outside world into the labyrinth and also to move throughout it. Unfortunately, they are sparsely scattered around the maze and you will have to battle hard from one gemstone to the next.

Chronos is an RPG but for anyone looking for the level of character detail and tuning that you would get from RPG’s like Skyrim will not find it here. You have four attributes to work with; Strength, Arcane, Agility and Vitality, and you earn points to upgrade these through combat experience only. Your character will always be of warrior class so even if you focus more on the Arcane you will still be a warrior. Your weapons come from exploring as there are no shops or mysterious strangers that will sell you a new axe for gold coins. All weapons can have their damage power upgraded by collecting dragon shards. There is a nice variety in the weapons you come across- Sword, Axes, Maces and my particular weapon of choice, a Spear, – although it is possible to keep the first weapon you choose and complete the game with it. There aren’t any side missions either that you can spend time doing to build up your character’s experience.

What Chronos does offer in an RPG way that I have never experienced before is that your character ages. When you die you get thrown out of the labyrinth back to your home world and as the labyrinth only opens once a year you must wait till then, licking your wounds and getting older before you can return. Obviously, this doesn’t happen in real time, in the game and you are just transported back to the nearest save stone that you last encountered. When you first enter the labyrinth you are a sprightly 18-year-old, nimble and quick. As you grow older though your strength will start to wane however you become wiser and more in tune to the arcane arts. This unique approach adds more to Chronos then you’d expect. You will die a lot in Dark Souls or Bloodborne and it’s frustrating, but with Chronos there seems to be a real price for being defeated over and over. This added a sense of dread that hung over me throughout my playthrough as if death itself was standing over me watching and waiting for me. The character appearance changes as the years pass and I felt it with the Hero as if the burden of their many years weighed also on my shoulders. Then as every decade of your life passes you get the option to choose a new perk out of three available. Some consideration is needed with each one of these options as what might work for you now might not be the best option later in life.

As for VR, Gunfire has built an exceptionally beautiful world within Chronos and with the detail you feel as if they had crafted every stone from hand. I can see why a developer would perhaps prefer a game this beautifully made in VR as the player can appreciate the design and detail up close compared to a more traditional screen. Aside from enjoying the view, there isn’t a lot VR offers here. Your POV is at a fixed position in every area you walk into as if you were a CCTV camera watching your Hero throughout their journey. For a game that relies on being able to dodge and parry a lot, I found a few times that I would end up getting stuck behind an enemy as they blocked the camera, which was especially frustrating when you died because of it. I was constantly either luring an enemy to an area where I had a better view or moving around the camera POV to take a better position to attack.

Chronos has a perfect mix of frustration and enjoyment built into the game. You will work hard to beat it but never spend too long repeating the same area over and over. It’s a great warmup for other harder games of this type. I would have enjoyed Chronos as much playing it on TV as in VR but for the platform it’s great to see a well-designed, polished game available. GunFire are definitely a developer to watch from here on in. Chronos is shallow on the RPG elements but will find its fans that don’t want the depth of character development and hours of side quests that other games in the genre have to offer. Its aging mechanic I hope becomes something other studios will make use of in games to come as every death matters more in this game than any other I have played. There is a bite to Chronos but I enjoyed sinking my teeth into it as much as it sunk them into me.

]]>The Gallery – Episode 1: Call of the Starseed Review. A Point and Blink Adventure.http://www.virtualrealityreviewer.com/GAME-detail/the-gallery-episode-1-call-of-the-starseed-review-a-point-and-blink-adventure/
Thu, 28 Apr 2016 13:50:56 +0000http://www.virtualrealityreviewer.com/?post_type=os_game&p=4402The Gallery - Episode 1: Call of the Starseed does have some fun moments and you do at times feel you are on an adventure, but unfortunately the story and the lack of things to do does get a bit boring by the end.

Cloudhead Games -The Gallery is an episodic first person adventure puzzle narrative driven, VR game available on the HTC Vive. The first episode “Call of the Starseed” is available to purchase on Steam right now. There will be four episodes in total.

The setting of Call of the Starseed is similar to an 80’s style action fantasy movie and takes place as you’d imagine in a coastal American town. It’s the kind of story where you wouldn’t be surprised if you came across the Goonies or even the Lost Boys when you’re exploring underground. Taking the role of Alex, who is either a girl or a boy as the game never gives you this information, so it depends on how you imagine yourself, you have come to look for your missing twin sister.

The game starts with a brief but handy (no pun intended) tutorial section where you are taught how to use your hands (Vive Controllers) to pick up and smash bottles. Then you are introduced to the blink system which you will probably become very familiar with this type of movement feature as you play more VR games. Blink works when you hold down a button on the controller and an aiming sight appears on the ground tracked by your head movement. When you look left and right it moves left and right then as you look up and down it moves closer and further away from you. When you let go of the button you are then teleported to that position.

From the tutorial, you are brought to the start menu but as this is Vive and VR, you find yourself standing in front of a table where you need to pick up a tape and place it into a tape player to load up the level. From here you are then transported inside a cave near a beach and are set loose to explore. You immediately just want to pick up every object you come across. This is where VR turns me from a nice guy into a bit of a jackass because I just picked up everything I interacted with and whenever I was done with it I would toss it away like some spoiled child. You can have lots of fun just picking up objects and interacting with them, like putting a candle out under water or cooking popcorn you find over the fire.

I was fully immersed in this world even if I constantly had the room limit appearing around me as I played, but it never really detached me from where I was. The only time I did get pulled out was getting up close with any of the NPCs as the graphics in the game were a little outdated but that didn’t really make any difference exploring around, you could believe that there was a kettle or a bottle in front of you waiting to be picked up. Unfortunately, you could never believe it was a real person talking to you.

As immersive as the world was the story never did draw me in. No real back story was given from the start and it’s mostly told through tape recordings you find and are played on your “tony talkman” as well as notes to read and talking with characters that the whole story unravels and even though the voice acting was top notch I was left feeling disappointed. It wasn’t until the second chapter, by not paying attention or missing it in the story, that I actually found out the girl who was talking to me through the tapes and who I was looking for was actually my twin sister. As the story is based on finding her and following her path further into danger I would have liked to have been more emotionally connected with her and with what was going on. I always felt a bit detached from the story. With the game being very narrative driven and besides a couple of puzzles and exploring there isn’t really a lot to do in the game so by the end I was starting to find myself getting a little bored.

The game’s strongest point is that at times you really feel you are in an adventure. It would be very hard to get that feeling of real excitement and adventure in another game, like the time when I was wandering around underground and I’d use the light in one hand to illuminate the map I was holding in my other hand. It wasn’t some computer character or movie actor it was me who was lost in the sewers. Even for a short game, about 2-2 ½ hours long each chapter brought a different setting to the game. The first chapter made me feel like I was involved in a mystery searching the beach and caves for clues on what to do next. Wading through the underground levels gave me the feeling as if I was in a horror game; VR me was waiting for someone or something to jump out at me while the real me was hoping I wouldn’t fall over when it happened and pull out every cable from the computer. Without giving too much away the later levels were more science fiction based.

The Gallery’s in-game inventory menu is lots of fun and a well-worked idea. You are carrying a backpack and when you need it you just reach over your shoulder and pull it out in front of you. It floats there as you select which item you need to remove and then when you are done you take it by the handle and put it over your back again. Any item that you are allowed to keep can easily be put in your inventory by moving your hand over your shoulder and when you release it will then drop into storage. The few puzzles are also enjoyable. You really get up close with them and using your hands as well as your head makes it feel more of a practical challenge then a puzzle. I did come across a few glitches where I had to restart a chapter-once when doing a puzzle and the other when I lost sound. Also some objects would flicker and be jerking when I interacted with them. I never had any issue with the comfort level and felt no disorientation or feeling woozy during my experience.

Reviewing a game in VR can be tricky as especially now when we are only just starting to play VR games, you don’t want to just get caught up enjoying the VR more than the game. This was my first real game on the Vive and it was nice to experience something other than a tech demo. When I first started playing I was giddy with the excitement of walking around and interacting with the world around me. But that excitement was perhaps caused more by the new experience of playing VR rather than for this specific game. From the start I did really want to enjoy my time in The Gallery but the story didn’t really help to bring me along with it and I even started to lose interest in listening to what the characters on tapes had to say and became more interested in throwing bottles against a wall. This is the first episode of the series and near the end it gave me flashbacks to some of the duller parts of the Assassin Creed games which I didn’t enjoy. I did feel like I was in that coastal area and now when I close my eyes I have my own memories of being inside of a sewer looking at strange markings on a wall. Getting that from a game is more than enough of a reason to slip on that helmet, load up The Gallery and head back to the 80’s.

]]>Sightline: The Chair gets updated for CV1 and Vive.http://www.virtualrealityreviewer.com/sightline-the-chair-gets-updated-for-cv1-and-vive/
Wed, 20 Apr 2016 14:55:32 +0000http://www.virtualrealityreviewer.com/?p=4385They say you never forget your first experience and for me with VR anyway, it was Sightline: The Chair one of the earlier tech demo’s available for the DK2, which has now been updated for the Oculus and HTC Vive consumer models. For anyone who hasn’t tried this experience, which is not definably not any […]

]]>They say you never forget your first experience and for me with VR anyway, it was Sightline: The Chair one of the earlier tech demo’s available for the DK2, which has now been updated for the Oculus and HTC Vive consumer models.

For anyone who hasn’t tried this experience, which is not definably not any of my family or friends as this is the demo I use to introduce them to VR. I would highly recommend having this experience in your library and for anyone who ever doubts the potential of VR this will win them over.

As amazing an experience Sightline: The Chair is in VR, where you watch the world around you swap and change at every turn of your head and get taken gradually from one scene to the next. It’s almost as enjoyable watching a noob putting out that headset and the smile on their face as they are transported into a new reality for the first time. Watching anyone twist and turn around waiting for the next moment that something appears while they are really facing towards the back of their own chair has brought me no end of entertainment.

]]>P·O·L·L·E·Nhttp://www.virtualrealityreviewer.com/p%c2%b7o%c2%b7l%c2%b7l%c2%b7e%c2%b7n/
Wed, 20 Apr 2016 13:28:09 +0000http://www.virtualrealityreviewer.com/?p=4395Developed by Mindfield Games in Helsinki, Finland, P·O·L·L·E·N is an atmospheric, suspenseful and highly interactive first person mystery exploration game. Built for both VR and traditional gaming console, P.O.L.L.E.N is set an alternative timeline to ours, where mega cooperations now own research and mining colonies all over the solar system. You play as a space mechanic […]

]]>Developed by Mindfield Games in Helsinki, Finland, P·O·L·L·E·N is an atmospheric, suspenseful and highly interactive first person mystery exploration game.

Built for both VR and traditional gaming console, P.O.L.L.E.N is set an alternative timeline to ours, where mega cooperations now own research and mining colonies all over the solar system. You play as a space mechanic sent to Research Base M, Kraken Mare on Saturn’s moon Titan, here you are to investigate the mysterious disappearance of one of the local research team members.

P.O.L.L.E.N is available to download now on Steam for Windows and Oculus. It will be available at a later date for both the Ps4 and HTC Vive.

]]>FATED: The Silent Oath Launch Trailerhttp://www.virtualrealityreviewer.com/fated-the-silent-oath-launch-trailer/
Wed, 20 Apr 2016 10:17:41 +0000http://www.virtualrealityreviewer.com/?p=4381FATED is a first-person virtual reality action-adventure game set in a beautiful colourful world. You play as a loving father and husband who must stop the giants of old from destroying the world and your family. Developed by Quebec-based indie studio Frima Studio, Fated is set to be released on the 28th April on both […]

]]>FATED is a first-person virtual reality action-adventure game set in a beautiful colourful world. You play as a loving father and husband who must stop the giants of old from destroying the world and your family.

Developed by Quebec-based indie studio Frima Studio, Fated is set to be released on the 28th April on both Oculus and Vive as well as PSVR when launched this October. The game will be released episodically.

]]>Insomniac’s Feral Rites – Teaser Trailerhttp://www.virtualrealityreviewer.com/insomniacs-feral-rites-teaser-trailer/
Tue, 19 Apr 2016 15:28:08 +0000http://www.virtualrealityreviewer.com/?p=4366Insomniac announced two new VR titles coming exclusively for the Oculus. The Unspoken, Feral Rites are both set to be released later this year. Feral Rites is a VR adventure-brawler set on a mystical island. Avenge the death of your father by brawling your way through harrowing missions and quests. Immerse yourself exploring unique areas of […]

]]>Insomniac announced two new VR titles coming exclusively for the Oculus. The Unspoken, Feral Rites are both set to be released later this year.

Feral Rites is a VR adventure-brawler set on a mystical island. Avenge the death of your father by brawling your way through harrowing missions and quests. Immerse yourself exploring unique areas of the island from under the jungle canopy to ruined temples while mastering new abilities — including the power to transform into a feral beast. Witness the brutality of savage violence all around you.

]]>Insomniac’s The Unspoken – Reveal Trailerhttp://www.virtualrealityreviewer.com/insomniacs-the-unspoken-reveal-trailer/
Tue, 19 Apr 2016 15:27:52 +0000http://www.virtualrealityreviewer.com/?p=4369Insomniac announced two new VR titles coming exclusively for the Oculus. The Unspoken, Feral Rites are both set to be released later this year. Learn the secret art of spellcasting. Veteran developer Insomniac Games presents The Unspoken—an Oculus Touch‐enabled VR action game that pulls players into a hidden world of spellcasting and magicians’ duels. Manipulate the […]

]]>Insomniac announced two new VR titles coming exclusively for the Oculus. The Unspoken, Feral Rites are both set to be released later this year.

Learn the secret art of spellcasting. Veteran developer Insomniac Games presents The Unspoken—an Oculus Touch‐enabled VR action game that pulls players into a hidden world of spellcasting and magicians’ duels. Manipulate the environment around you with the powerful arcane forces that flow through your fingertips, summon unfathomable monstrosities with your bare hands, and rise up through the ranks of an urban magic fight club

]]>Game of Thrones 360 Videohttp://www.virtualrealityreviewer.com/game-of-thrones-360-video/
Thu, 14 Apr 2016 08:50:57 +0000http://www.virtualrealityreviewer.com/?p=4362With nearly everyone getting into VR these days it is no surprise that the biggest TV show in world ‘Game of Thrones’ would also have some VR content of its own. The show which is based off of A Song of Ice and Fire series created by George R.R Martin is about to premiere its […]

]]>With nearly everyone getting into VR these days it is no surprise that the biggest TV show in world ‘Game of Thrones’ would also have some VR content of its own. The show which is based off of A Song of Ice and Fire series created by George R.R Martin is about to premiere its 6th season later this month.

Anyone that would be familiar with the books or the TV show would know that George R.R Martin’s world has a very large roster of characters which are spread out around his immense world. This then is probably why that the opening credits of the TV show there is a map of the known world showing the audience all the different locations that the show will be going to.

Now you can explore this map through your browsers or in VR as there is a 360 immersive video available to watch. So now you can feel like one of the many, many gods of the world and look down and around on those that worship you.

]]>Facebook Surround 360http://www.virtualrealityreviewer.com/facebook-surround-360/
Wed, 13 Apr 2016 11:14:46 +0000http://www.virtualrealityreviewer.com/?p=4354At Facebook’s annual global developer conference yesterday, Facebook showed their commitment to help further content on their platform when they introduced a brand new camera capable of capturing 3D 360-degree footage called the “Surround 360”. Facebook who also own Oculus, are going to release the software and plans for the camera free online this summer […]

]]>At Facebook’s annual global developer conference yesterday, Facebook showed their commitment to help further content on their platform when they introduced a brand new camera capable of capturing 3D 360-degree footage called the “Surround 360”.

Facebook who also own Oculus, are going to release the software and plans for the camera free online this summer and both will be available through GitHub. An open source platform will help drive the growth of the system and in turn provide more content available for VR.

‘Surround 360’ which is packed full with 17 cameras, 3 of these are fisheye cameras with one pointing up and two pointing down and an impressive 14 around the circumference. Facebook say it offers up to 8k resolution for each eye. The unit is shaped like the old spin tops and is made out of aluminium and the design helps provide hours of recording without the cameras overheating.

The stitching software made available will drastically reduce post-production time using “computational imagine algorithms that will stitch all the images together”. The output which can be viewed by Gear VR or the Oculus Rift.

The camera will not come cheap at a whopping $30,000 but still won’t be the most expensive 360-camera on the market.

Check out the official page here and for anyone wanting more details can check the Facebook blog on the camera here.